September 18

In the 1960s and 1970s, over 50,000 Americans fled across the border to Canada to resist military service during the Vietnam War. Unguarded Border: American Emigres in Canada During the Vietnam War, the latest book by ISU History Professor, Dr. Donald Maxwell explores how these Americans in exile forged cosmopolitan identities, coming to regard themselves as global citizens, a status complicated by the Canadian government’s attempts to claim them and the U.S. government’s eventual efforts to reclaim them. Unguarded Border offers a new perspective on a movement that permanently changed perceptions of compulsory military service, migration, and national identity.